LinkedIn Lead Generation Automation: Pros and Cons

If you are looking for a platform to find potential customers and partners, depending on your audience, LinkedIn might be the best social platform to grow your business. This is because the cost per lead is lower, and the conversion rates are usually higher. Not only that, but the platform also offers a variety of ways to search for leads for free, along with a few tools that can help you make the process easier.

However, when working with LinkedIn, there are a few tasks that you must deal with daily, which can take up too much of your time. Although LinkedIn does not allow you to automate these tasks,  some growth hacking tools can be used to decrease the manual workload. Different tools can help you automate various actions like adding a contact, sending a message, extracting data, visiting profiles, etc.

LinkedIn automation is a good choice for your B2B lead generation only if you know how to do it correctly and in a safe manner. Not only that, but LinkedIn also sets a few restrictions when it comes to using automation tools. This article will help you become more aware of the pros and cons of LinkedIn automation so you can make wiser and correct decisions.

LinkedIn automation pros

Automates most of your daily tasks

People who use LinkedIn for their daily tasks, such as lead generation, expanding their professional network, searching for a job, hiring new talents, and knowing how much work they need to get done daily. These people need to manually send follow-up requests, connection messages, invitations, emails, and many more.

However, using LinkedIn automation tools can eliminate the need to accomplish these tasks manually every day. This allows them to allot their time to more crucial tasks and build a strong relationship with prospect leads, close deals, and the like.

Furthermore, some of the tasks you can automate using LinkedIn automation are endorsing connections, sending connection requests, sending follow-up messages, auto-visiting profiles, extracting companies and profiles, inviting people to join groups, inviting people to follow a company’s page, and many more.

You can work without working

Probably, one of the best things about LinkedIn automation is that you can leave the tools running without supervision, and it can get your job done on your behalf. Of course, only when you have set it up correctly. With LinkedIn automation, you no longer have to worry about juggling multiple tasks at once and not accomplishing everything because your plate is already full.

Receive ready leads

Using LinkedIn automation to generate potential customers and partners is super efficient and more straightforward. This is because you only have to set up your goal, select your target audience, narrow down your target audience as much as possible, and launch the automation tool for sending out invitation requests and follow-up messages a few days after completing the first action. That way, it can help you receive ready leads, prospects showing interest in what you offer, and quickly and directly get in touch with them.

LinkedIn automation cons

Limited scaling possibilities

LinkedIn has enforced a new lower limit for sending new connection requests to 15-20 per day (100 per week and 400 per month). Given the lower volume, you can ask yourself if the automation still makes sense for your business. In case you are running multi-channel outreach where LinkedIn is part of the sequence, you will face this issue sooner than later.

This new restriction can help users to shift their focus from quantity to quality. This can help reduce the number of poorly targeted prospects that are usually generated by software programs. On top of that, it gives you the ability to send email outreach only to interested prospects, ensuring a high engagement rate (you can find email addresses without being connected to that person).

Tips to stay safe while doing LinkedIn automation

• Avoid sending more than 20 connection invites per day (5 days per week)
• Avoid sending more than 60 personal messages to your 1st level connections per day
• Withdraw pending invitations
• Ensure that your automation tool mimics user behavior
• Monitor your acceptance rate

Risk of being restricted

LinkedIn has its ways to detect unusual robotic activities and restricts or blocks profiles because of this. They prohibit the use of bots or automation tools to access their services. So, it is essential that you always limit the activities you automate, primarily when you use automation for plenty of actions.

Lastly, you must be aware of how to use the platform safely to prevent your profile from being restricted or blocked. Here are a few things you can do when your account gets restricted:

• Clean up your number of pending requests.
• Temporarily stop any activity on your profile for 2 to 3 days.
• After 2 to 3 days of inactivity and your account is still restricted, you can write a letter to LinkedIn’s support team.
  

Risk of being blocked permanently

Getting blocked from LinkedIn is the long-term consequence of the disadvantage mentioned above. If you continuously fail to follow LinkedIn regulations and use automation tools beyond their limit, you might get permanently blocked after being restricted as a warning. As a result, you can no longer add new connections to your network.

Although you can always create a new LinkedIn profile, it may take a significant amount of time to boost your profile, increase the number of connections you have, post content, and the like.

Choice of right tools

Choosing the best LinkedIn automation tool can be pretty tricky, mainly because there are many options available in the market. It is also crucial because the user must choose an automation tool that will allow them to maximize value while searching for prospects on LinkedIn.

Here are a few things you might want to consider when choosing a LinkedIn automation tool:

• Define a list of features that you need
• Test different tools to effectively define which works best
• Choose a tool to use from a long-term perspective
  

Spending extra costs for LinkedIn automation subscription

The best automation tools in the market are expensive and certainly not free. So you have to assess your needs and determine whether LinkedIn automation is vital for your company, especially if you are currently tight on budget.

Final Thoughts

The automation of your LinkedIn lead generation brings about several crucial advantages and disadvantages. But by properly setting up your automation tool and following LinkedIn policies, you can avoid restrictions and facing other consequences. LinkedIn lead generation can be helpful to your sales and marketing team. You can also leverage data-driven marketing to help you further increase revenue and ultimately grow your company.